A leading professor was responsible for partly ide

A leading professor was responsible for partly identifying a teenage victim of mad cow disease in an interview with BBC’s Newsnight, the GMC ruled today.

(thurs)

Peter Behan, 64, told the programme in April 1996 that a 15-year-old girl had been admitted to his specialist unit at a Glasgow Hospital with symptoms of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease.

Within weeks of the programme being aired reporters had discovered that the girl was Helen Rutherford and tracked her down to her family’s home in Bearsden, Glasgow.

The media is said to have laid siege to the house for a fortnight as Miss Rutherford’s parents steadfastly refused to be interviewed.

They told the GMC this week that the continued presence of journalists outside their house added to their daughter’s distress.

Following a second opinion, Miss Rutherford has since recovered from the symptoms she claimed she was suffering.

But she complained to the GMC that Professor Behan had breached her confidentiality.

The doctor, a consultant neurologist at the Institute of Neurological Sciences at Southern General NHS Trust Hospital in Glasgow, told the hearing that he felt it was overwhelmingly in the public interest to talk about the case because the government at that time had denied youngsters were at risk.

He also pointed out that he had mentioned the teenager whilst giving evidence at the High Court days before the Newsnight interview.

But the committee ruled that Professor Behan had unnecessarily disclosed information about Miss Rutherford without consent, and that that enabled her identity to be discovered by the media.

He was also charged with deliberately using information from a colleague’s thesis in an article he published.

But the professor, who claimed it was an innocent mistake, was cleared of that charge.

Prof Behan, of South Erskine, Park, Bearsden, still denies serious professional misconduct.

A judgement is expected later today.

(thurs)
ends

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